446343

Presidential Address
Currents Left and Right:

Ideology in Comparative Education
ERWIN H. EPSTEIN
The thought that scholarship may not be wholly invulnerable to ideology

profoundly disturbs the academic world. Science is supposed to discover
truth-it seeks to scrape off the veneer of subjective judgment to achieve
wisdom, insight, and understanding. Systematic methods are painstakingly
devised to serve this goal. Entire tomes are devoted solely to advancing
objectivity in procedure and to avoiding ideological deception. Such fear
of ideology is well justified, for a science contaminated by partisan belief
diminishes intellectual activity.
We in comparative education should be particularly concerned about
entanglements with ideology. Comparative fields are peculiarly vulnerable,
being exposed to varying national orientations and incompatible world
views. Moreover, education is society's most enduring mechanism for
inculcating belief systems. Yet we have rarely openly acknowledged the
existence of ideology in our activities, however much we wrestle over
competing methodologies. Whether out of a sense of academic etiquette
or due to simple obliviousness, scholars in the field have generally failed
to identify explicitly the ideological roots of rival orientation. Unless we
boldly confront the issue of ideology it will obscure insight and erode the
value of our work.
I shall argue that what matters about an educational theory-especially
one devoted to politics of human action-is not only what the theory
explicitly says but what it omits to say or what it contains that is difficult
to acknowledge. I shall argue also that what matters about methodology
in comparative education is not only the procedure employed in the
investigation of a problem but the value judgments that inform that
procedure. Finally, I intend to demonstrate that the leading model that
has been used to explain the development of comparative education has
been inadequate, and that we need more competently to account for the
ideologies that have influenced the field's development.
"Progress" in the Development of Comparative Education
It has become conventional in our field to view the development of

comparative education as having progressed in stages. Noah and EcksteinI gratefully acknowledge the helpful comments of C. Arnold Anderson, Sandra Ben-Zeev, John
Craig, Gail Kelly, and the students and staff in the Spring 1982 Comparative Education Seminar at
the University of Chicago.
ComparativeEducation Review, vol. 27, no. 1.
? 1983 by the Comparative and International Education Society. All rights reserved.
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EPSTEIN
the title of whose influential book, Towarda Scienceof Comparative

Education,
is redolent with the notion of progression-identify three broad methodological stages: stage 1 is characterized as a data-gathering enterprise
of an encyclopedic and somewhat indiscriminate order; stage 2, ushered
in by Michael Sadler and advanced most notably by Nicholas Hans and
Isaac Kandel, stressed explanation rather than description and sought
that explanation in a study of the historical context and the influence of
cultural forces; and stage 3, now considered mainstream methodology,
consists of the application of empirical social science methods and a selfconsciousness about procedures.' Kazamias, although differing somewhat
from the way Noah and Eckstein view the field's development, nevertheless
distinguishes between "old" and "new" approaches to methodology in
comparative education. The old approaches, Kazamias claims, were descriptive and prescriptiveand indiscriminately blended "what is" in education
with "what ought to be." By contrast, the new methods-which Kazamias
refers to as the philosophical, functional, and problem approaches-tend
to be microcosmic, more analytic, and more "scientific."2More recently,
Kelly and Altbach, after acknowledging the past approaches cited by
others, report the rise of what now have become the "new"methodological
perspectives in comparative education-ethnographic
approaches and
frameworks that utilize concepts such as neocolonialism, world-system
analysis, and dependency theory to argue that educational systems are
directly affected by international currents and that national school systems
and the relations between school and the nation are no longer worthy
subjects of analysis." However much these descriptions of the field vary,
they all maintain the notion of progress.
However convenient it has been to view the development of comparative
education as evolving in stages, this perspective has created confusion
over the relative utility and value of alternative approaches. With the
maturing of comparative education we should be able to see how each
successive stage has represented an increment of greater objectivity and
clarity in the study of education. Instead we find the contemporary literature
in disarray over the question of what is appropriate methodology in comparative education. Is the student of comparative education in the 1980s
more likely to feel secure in the appropriateness or objectivity of a chosen
methodology than was the student of the 1950s? I know that I, as a product
of the 1960s, felt far more certain about what was "good" methodology
I Harold J. Noah and Max A. Eckstein, Toward a Science
of ComparativeEducation (New York:
Macmillan, 1969), p. 65.
2 Andreas M. Kazamias, "Some Old and New
Approaches to Methodology in Comparative
Education," ComparativeEducation Review 5 (October 1961): 90-96.
3Gail P. Kelly and Philip G. Altbach, "ComparativeEducation: A Field in Transition,"in International
Bibliographyof ComparativeEducation, ed. Philip G. Altbach, Gail P. Kelly, and David H. Kelly (New
York: Praeger, 1981), pp. 12-15.
4
February1983
IDEOLOGYIN COMPARATIVE
EDUCATION
in thoseformativeyearsthanI do now.Methodologists
continueto claim
steadyprogressfor our field as measuredby the replacementof "old,"
ideologicallybiasedapproachesby "new,"increasinglyobjectivemethods.
I contendthat such claimsare groundless.Howevermuchwe mayhave
improvedour applicationof technologicaland quantitativetools to the
analysisof educationalproblems,we have progressednarya step in becoming disinterested,ideologicallyunbiasedobserversof school-society
relations.
The ideologicalroots of educationalresearchhave been identified
before, most notablyby Paulston,who viewsideologicaltendenciesthat
characterize
majortheoreticalapproachesas beingnot necessarilyincomHe
even
suggeststhatcomparativeresearchmightdrawcritically
patible.4
from these countervailingorientations.AlthoughPaulston'sdescription
of comparativeresearchis uniquein its acknowledgment
of ideologyand
in itsavoidanceof the ideaof progressivedevelopment,he underestimates
the irreconcilability
of competingideologiesand identifiesonly two paradigms-the equilibriumand conflictperspectives--asbases for more
specificconceptualmodels.I believe,however,that if we view ideology
as the frameworkof politicalconsciousness,as the set of ideas around
which a group of people organizethemselvesfor politicalaction,5the
notionof achievingsynthesisbydrawingselectively
fromdifferentparadigms
roots
is
dubious.
Furthermore,Paulston
having competingideological
failsto identifya thirdmajortheoreticalperspective-the "problem"
apfromthe equilibriumandconflictparproach-whichdifferssubstantially
adigms.
To showhow irreconcilable
these paradigmsare, infusedas they are
by rivalideologies,I shall examinetwo debates.The firstwas between
PhilipFosteron the one side and MartinCarnoyand others.The second
wasbetweenMargaret
ArcherandEdmundKing.Thesedebatesrepresent,
in myjudgment,the most acerbic,but possiblythe most significant,exchangesever to gracethe literaturein comparativeeducation.At the risk
of oversimplification,
I willlabelthecompetingframeworks
in thesedebates
and
"neorelativist."
"neo-Marxist,"
"neopositivist,"
Neopositiviststend to
connectdeductive-nomological
aimed
at
analysis,
makinglawlikegeneralizationsusingmultiplenationor societaldata,to functionalexplanation,
in contrastto "orthodox"
whoareconcernedonlywithestablishing
positivists
4 Rolland G. Paulston, "Social and Educational Change: Conceptual Frameworks," Comparative
Education Review 21 (June/October 1977): 370-95.
5 See H. Mark Roelofs, Ideology and Myth in American Politics: A Critiqueof a National Political
Mind (Boston: Little, Brown, 1976), p. 4. I prefer Roelof's definition to others that make little
distinction between ideology and epistemology or cultural expression, because my purpose is to show
that an intrinsic bias exists in prevailing comparative approaches. For example, Wuthnow's definitionas "any subset of symbolic constructions which, in fact, serves as a vehicle for the expression and
transmission of collectively shared meanings"-would not serve my purpose (see Robert Wuthnow,
"Comparative Ideology," InternationalJournal of ComparativeSociology22 [1981]: 121-40, at 121).

EPSTEIN
universal laws. This is not to say that in all cases positivists use multinational
or multicultural data; they may focus on a particular society using a
framework that calls for replication in other societies. Neo-Marxists view
ideology as pervasive in all theoretical frameworks, unlike "orthodox"
Marxists who see only theories that support capitalism as being ideologically
infused. And in contrast to "orthodox" relativists, who focus on "verisimilitude" (rather than truth) in science, neorelativists are also preoccupied
with the practical application of "criticalrationalism"in particular situations.
The fine distinctions between orthodox and neo-orientations are important
to show the derivations of contemporary theories; my main concern,
however, is with the overall contrasts between the positivist, Marxist, and
relativist frameworks. These contrasts should become clear in my discussion
of the debates.
First, however, it will be important to recognize that comparative education invites ideology insofar as that field has practical utility in the
reform of schooling. If comparative education were no more than an
academic exercise, it would furnish no motive for the development of
political consciousness. Yet we display almost an obsession over the need
to achieve some practical benefit from comparative study. Rarely have we
viewed as a primary benefit knowledge for its own sake or the quest of
knowledge to strengthen the mind or to gain personal mastery over the
environment. Such benefits are apparently too elusive, too impervious to
empirical demonstration to justify investment of our time, let alone of
our research institutions' resources. The preoccupation over appropriate
policy and the infusion of ideology which informs policy research should
become evident in my review of the debates.
The Foster-Carnoy et al. Debate
This exchange focused on educational policy for developing countries.

Foster's main argument was that in these countries "no type of educational
planning will succeed unless it is based upon the aspirations and expectations
of the majority of the population or provides incentive structures that
will allow these aspirations to be modified to accord with national goals."
Furthermore, although "the demands placed upon the central polity for
equity, welfare and development far exceed the system's capacity to respond,
[the] answer to this problem is less, not moreconcentration of authority."6
It would be difficult to find a statement manifestly more given to
democratic action in education than Foster's. But this seemingly democratic
statement is informed by functional thought and positivist methodology,
which are not ideologically neutral. Although the neo-Marxist literature
6
Philip Foster, "Dilemmas of Educational Development: What We Might Learn from the Past,"
ComparativeEducation Review 19 (October 1975): 375-92, quote on 393.
February1983
EDUCATION
on the disabilities of functionalism is familiar to most of us, the critique

of Foster's view by Carnoy and by Devon is worth examining.
Carnoy begins his analysis by showing that Foster's position is Schumpeterian; that is, it views the market system as comparatively just and fair
and as most conducive to economic development. Interference by the
state into the workings of the market erodes the inherent equitability and
efficiency of that system and is therefore usually unwarranted. Carnoy
contends, however, that the Schumpeterian model is naive, that the state
in nonsocialist developing countries is controlled not by disinterested
parties but by the local bourgeoisie and by foreign, ex-colonial groups
who seek economic stability in their own interest rather than genuine
reform and democratic, decentralized decision making.
According to Carnoy, the colonial "state of mind" that Foster attributes
to antiquated interference with "natural"market forces is not an ephemeral
characteristic of developing states but is the product of a firmly grounded
economic system and social structure "essential to the functioning of
dependent capitalism and the relatively small elite that profits from it."
The state, for Carnoy, is not a frivolous manipulator of the market but
a principal mechanism through which the mass of people is systematically
controlled during the development process. Schools serve as an important
part of the state's repressive apparatus by socializing and cognitively preparing labor for the capitalist production of goods. The idea that the
state can simply refrain from interfering with the market is fatuous if not
malicious, because it ignores the vested interests of elites and plays into
their hands by making it appear that the state can be a just and politically
neutral actor.' Devon further attacks Foster for his self-proclaimed neutrality
as a social scientist. "How can his extensive defense of a laissez-faireeconomy
with a decentralized political system be viewed as politically neutral? At
one point, Foster explicitly admonishes what 'the state must not do' on
a particular policy issue, and it is nowhere clear that he is offering any
alternatives. Indeed, to a curious extent Foster reduces education to economics and economics to politics. For, having declined to discuss the
important political and social functions of education, his contextual discussion of economics is primarily in terms of political prescriptions."8
Foster's response to his critics is classic positivism and can be summed
up by his remark, "It has been suggested that I take refuge behind the
data; I take this as a compliment and find it a vastly preferable alternative
to taking refuge behind rhetoric."' To Foster, neo-Marxist analyses of
Education
7 Martin Carnoy, "The Role of Education in a Strategy for Social Change," Comparative
Review 19 (October 1975): 393-402.
Richard F. Devon, "Foster's Paradigm-Surrogate and the Wealth of Underdeveloped Nations,"
8
ComparativeEducation Review 19 (October 1975): 403-13, quote on 406.
9 Philip Foster, "Commentary on the Commentaries," ComparativeEducationReview 14 (October
1975): 423-33, quote on 424. That the arguments of radical scholars are no more than empty
Comparative Education Review

EPSTEIN
educational structures are elaborate and tortured excursions into a reality

that exists only in the minds of neo-Marxists. His critics rely not on careful
methods for testing assumptions but on predigested ideas of the "world
order." For them the future is known, and revolutionary transformation
is inevitable. Such thinking gives rise to a sense of resignation over the
capabilities of education to influence the social order, and therefore "attempts at social engineering are doomed to failure and amount to nothing
more than meaningless tinkering with an already 'doomed' social system."'0
Thus Foster admonishes the neo-Marxists for their disdain of empirical
validation to understand reality. Devon contends that Foster's claim of
empirical objectivity is hypocritical in view of his inclination to prescribe
policy, and Carnoy protests Foster's functionalism, which evaluates a system
in terms of its capacity to meet the exigencies needed for survival in the
face of change-threatening forces. It is worth noting that each side accuses
the other of promoting passivity and obstructing genuine development.
Foster claims that the neo-Marxists' preinterpreted reality gives rise to a
sense of dealing with already doomed social systems, and the neo-Marxists
contend that Foster's idea of self-regulated, functionally integrated systems
resists change. Moreover, the real differences between the neo-Marxist
and neopositivist orientations in comparative education have been not so
much in terms of the latter's greater propensity to use empirical data but
of these groups' tendency to apply knowledge-even
identical data-for
different ends. To the positivists, Marxists use information to bear out
their predetermined views of social change. To the Marxists, the positivist
facade of objectivity in empirical data collection obscures their support
for the prevailing socioeconomic structure.
It is remarkable that two positions so vastly contrary could both dominate
so much thought in comparative education. It is also noteworthy that so
little effort has been made to examine the divergent points of departure
upon which these positions, and so much of our literature, rest. I wish
at least to begin such an examination, first with a brief review of the
methodological assumptions of Anderson and Foster, who in separate
pieces in the early 1960s established neopositivism as the mainstream
paradigm for comparative education.
Positivism in Comparative Education
Anderson claims that the purpose of comparative education is "to deal

with complex systems of correlations among educational characteristics
rhetoric is a theme to which Foster has returned recurrently. In his 1971 presidential address, Foster
claimed that radicals are "trapped at a level of rhetoric which makes it difficult for them to think
through the full implications of their arguments" (Philip Foster, "Presidential Address: The Revolt
against the Schools," ComparativeEducation Review 15 [October 1971]: 268).
10Foster,
"Commentary of the Commentaries," p. 423.
8
February 1983

EDUCATION
and between these and traits of social structure, with little reference to
the individuality of the society from which our data were derived. By
convention ... comparative study involves correlation across the boundaries
of societies-whether these societies represent different centuries in one
area or spatially distinct societies and sub-societies.""With careful attention
to categorizing empirical observations, correlating precisely delineated
variables, and systematically testing experientially derived propositions,
Anderson believes that the comparative method can reveal ordered and
repetitive patterns of social change. Both he and Foster equate comparison
with Nadel's description of covariation, which treats social situations as
consisting not of random items but of facts that hang together by some
"meaningful nexus or intrinsic fitness."'2 Schools function only partially
autonomously within a matrix containing other social institutions; the
comparative method regards education as a specific variable and attempts
to control its association with other social variables to ascertain invariant
relationships. In this way comparison is used "to throw light on processes
abstracted from time and even apart from conceptions of [evolutionary]
stages."'3 Anderson and Foster display their affinity to positivism by eschewing inquiry into the uniqueness and ultimate origins of discrete social
phenomena-so characteristic of extreme historicism-in favor of bringing
clarity to propositions about education and society.'4
Anderson identifies three types of correlations necessary for the development of the field. These are (1) patterns of relationships among
various aspects of educational systems; (2) a typology of educational systems
that compresses many patterns of data into simplified constructions, thus
allowing for a higher level of abstraction; and (3) relationships between
various educational characteristics and associated sociological, economic,
or other noneducational features. It is interesting, however, that in the
20 years or so that a positivist position has been established in comparative
education, scholars working in this tradition have made only marginal
progress in identifying appropriate patterns of relationships and in establishing a typology of educational systems, although studies by Hopper,
by Archer, and by Anderson may be exceptions.'5 Almost no hologeistic
C. Arnold Anderson, "Methodology of Comparative Education,"InternationalReviewof Education
"11
7 (1961): 24-43, quote on 29.
12 Ibid., and Philip Foster, "Comparative Methodology and the Study of African Education,"
ComparativeEducationReview,vol. 4 (October 1960). See also S. F. Nadel, Foundationsof SocialAnthropology
(Glenco, Ill.: Free Press, 1951), p. 224.
1SAnderson, "Methodology of Comparative Education," p. 28.
14Modern positivism reached its zenith under the
guidance of Rudolf Carnap in the 1930s at
the University of Chicago, where Anderson and Foster wrote their seminal works on
comparative
methodology (see Rudolf Carnap, "Testability and Meaning," Philosophyof Science, vols. 3-4 [1936-
37]).
isEarl I. Hopper, "A Typology for the Classification of Educational Systems," Sociology2 (1968):
29-46; Margaret Archer, Social Origins of Educational Systems(Beverly Hills, Calif.: Sage, 1979); C.
Arnold Anderson, "Social Selection in Education and Economic Development,"
mimeographed (Education Department of the World Bank, February 1982).
ComparativeEducation Review

EPSTEIN
studies, which measure theoretical variables in large, worldwide samples

of human cultures and test relationships among them, of the sort proposed
by Anderson, are to be found in the literature on education,'6 and challenges
to positivism have emerged that are serious enough to threaten its established
place in the field.
There have been three notable obstacles to the advancement of a
positivist tradition in comparative education. The first is a tacit but pervasive
skepticism over what Kaplan refers to as the "myth of methodology"the idea that it does not much matter what we do if only we do it rightthat tends to be associated with positivism.'7 Self-consciousness about
methodology might be a sign of a field's maturity, but if excessive it can
have a repressive effect on the conduct of inquiry. Practitioners have often
been reluctant to abandon descriptive, even impressionistic, approaches
that are convenient to apply to practical problems in favor of methodological
purity.
The second obstacle is a tendency to rely indiscriminately on nations
rather than on more discrete entities such as tribal or ethnic groups as
units of analysis. The analytic comparability of nations is highly problematic,
as is the feasibility of reliable sampling when the number of units available
for comparison is so small. Yet Noah and Eckstein, in the most comprehensive work to have advanced the positivist orientation since Anderson's
and Foster's early pieces,'8 do not even consider hologeistic research,
however much that approach may be the most logical extension of positivism.
Indeed, it is not surprising that Noah, in his presidential address in 1974
(a few years after his and Eckstein's book, Towarda Scienceof Comparative
Education, appeared), conceded the limitations of cross-national studies.
What is surprising is his advancement of micro studies and a focus on
"casesthat may lie well off the regression plane" to fill gaps in understanding
created by the small within-country and cross-country variances researchers
were finding to explain such variables as achievement.19 Rather than
16Anderson
specifically mentions Murdoch's study of kinship and Udy's study of economic
organization-both displaying hologeistic methods-as models for comparative analysis (Anderson,
"Methodology of Comparative Education," p. 30). See G. P. Murdock, Social Structure (New York:
Macmillan, 1949); and Stanley Udy, Organizationof Work(New Haven, Conn.: HRAF Press, 1959).
Perhaps the only examples of hologeistic research to be found in the literature on education are
Erwin H. Epstein, "Cross-cultural Sampling and a Conceptualization of 'Professional' Instruction,"
Journal of ExperimentalEducation 33 (Summer 1965): 395-401; and John D. Herzog, "Deliberate
Instruction and Household Structure: A Cross-cultural Study,"Harvard EducationalReview 32 (1962):
310-42. For a description of the early development of the hologeistic approach, see John W. M.
Whiting, "The Cross-cultural Method," in Handbookof Social Psychology,ed. Gardner Lindsey, 2 vols.
(Cambridge, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1954), 1:523-31.
Abraham Kaplan, "Positivism," in International Encyclopediaof the Social Sciences,ed. David L.
"17
Sills (New York: Macmillan, 1968), 12:394.
"8Noah and Eckstein (n. 1 above).
19Harold J. Noah, "Fast-Fish and Loose-Fish in Comparative Education," ComparativeEducation
Review 18 (October 1974): 341-47. In discussing the limitations of macro studies, Noah referred
10
February 1983

EDUCATION
suggesting the importance of refining units of analysis to advance the

"science" of comparative education, Noah came close to saying that the
field's scientific foundation-the systematic search for generalizations and
repetitive patterns in social phenomena-was about as advanced as it
could be.
The third obstacle is the most important and the one on which I wish
to focus most attention. I refer here to the ideological component in the
positivist orientation. Ironically, positivism-or scientific empiricism as it
is sometimes called-emerged as a reaction against religious, metaphysical,
and political explanation. Yet we find the positivist impulse under increasingly strident attack because of its ideological bias. To be sure, classical
positivism is open to criticism because the degree of clarity it can bring
to propositions is necessarily limited; criteria for confirmation or disconfirmation of propositions must be liberal enough to allow for statements
containing theoretical terms, whose verification must remain remote and
indirect and therefore susceptible to ideologies, myths, and even metaphysics. On this point Max Weber has given eloquent testimony, and I
need do no more than refer you to his work.20 But most of those who
have advocated more precise measurement of variables and greater clarity
in propositions about education have deliberately gone beyond the search
for lawlike regularities. Anderson, for example, contended 2 decades ago
that the great "missing link" in comparative education is "the almost total
absence of information about the outcomes or products of educational
systems."21Unlike the classical positivists, who were content with finding
"logical" connections among statements capable of verification, leading
ultimately to a comprehensive synthesis of such knowledge, Anderson
and most other neopositivists in comparative education are preoccupied
with causal connections. They are concerned not merely with how education
covaries with other variables but with the consequences of education as
an independent variable, especially as it has affected the development,
or "modernization," of nations. It is in this regard that they have opened
themselves up to the most serious criticism of all-that of ideological bias.
"Development" is not a value-free concept. It is infused with normative
meaning, and, indeed, its content has changed, as have the end states
with which it has been associated. Packenham has contended, for example,
that as prevailing political values in the United States were revised during
the post-World War II period, so was the conception of development.
Originally, development was viewed in terms of economic growth and
largely to the research on international achievement in mathematics (see Torsten Husen, ed., International
Study of Achievementin Mathematics:A ComparisonbetweenTwelve Countries[New York: Wiley, 1967],
vols. 1-2).
20 Max Weber, Methodologyof the Social Sciences, trans. and ed. Edward A. Shils and Henry A.
Finch (Glencoe, Ill.: Free Press, 1949), pp. 49-112. See also Kaplan, p. 390.
21 Anderson, "Methodology of Comparative Education,"
p. 30.
11

EPSTEIN
was translatedinto policy by the MarshallPlan and Point FourLegislation.

Shortly afterward, as reflected in the Mutual Security Act, development
became associatedin part with militarysecurity.Laterstill, goals of political
participation and the building of democratic institutions, as embodied,
for example, in Title IX of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1966, became
equal with economic growth in defining development.22Most recently,
the reduction of inequalityhasjoined the set of propositionalcomponents
of which "development" consists.23In short, the meanings ascribed to
development have been determined by the range of values used to define
desirable end states.
Notwithstanding the unquestioned acceptance of development as a
universallydesirable goal by comparativistsin the neopositivisttradition,
development can never be wholly based on objective, rationalistic,and
indisputable premises. Indeed, scholarsare increasinglyobserving "overdevelopment" in some societies: a condition in which the intangiblecomponents of human existencedecline as the tangibleindicesof development
improve.24The benefits of development, including the outcomes and
products of education, must remain open to question if social pathologies
are a by-productof expanded materialwealth and politicalequality.NeoMarxists may be faulted for their relative inattentiveness to empirical
validation, but they have a strong case in attributing ideological bias to
the work of neopositivists such as Foster and Anderson. All scholars as
members of society are part of the studied reality,and their beliefs, which
are prior to their scholarship, are influenced by the historical reality in
which they participate.25However much positivistsmay avow the probity
of personal dissociation in the diagnosis of a subject, the process of investigation itself transforms social reality.Consider that a generalization
regarding social reality is a statement about "typical"-or "regularities"
in-behavior; a scientificallydescribedmechanismof behavioris not simply
an empirical fact descriptive of a sample of observationsbut a model of
conformity for the entire universe of individualsto whom the statement
2 R. A.
Packenham, Liberal America and the Third World (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University
Press, 1973).
23See, e.g., Irma Adelman and C. T. Morris, Economic Growthand Social Equity in Developing
Countries (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1973); and Dudley Seers, "The Meaning of
Development," in The Political Economyof Developmentand Underdevelopment,ed. C. K. Wilber (New
York: Random House, 1973).
24Robert N. Bellah, BeyondBelief (New York: Harper & Row, 1970); Dean C. Tibbs, "Modernization
Theory and the Study of National Societies: A Critical Perspective," ComparativeStudiesin Societyand
History 15 (1973): 199-226; S. Chodak, Societal Development(New York: Oxford University Press,
1973); C. H. Anderson, The Sociologyof Survival (Homewood, Ill.: Dorsey, 1976); and Daniel Chirot,
"Changing Fashions in the Study of the Social Causes of Economic and Political Change," in The
State of Sociology:Problemsand Prospects,ed. James F. Short, Jr. (Beverly Hills, Calif.: Sage, 1981), pp.
259-82.
25 See Jerzy J. Wiatr, "Sociology-Marxism-Reality," in Marxism and Sociology: Viewsfrom Eastern
Europe, ed. Peter L. Berger (New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1969), pp. 18-36.
12
February1983

EDUCATION
applies. Typical behavior is normative behavior. To make known what

is typical is often to make it more typical. To show that engineering
students get higher-paying jobs is not simply a neutral finding; it may
have the effect of producing more engineers. Merton recognized this
when he wrote about "self-fulfilling"prophecies-forecasts that influence
their own realization.26
The Archer-King Debate
I wish now to turn to the second pivotal debate in comparative education-that between Archerand King-in which positivismis challenged
on another side, by exponents of the problem approach, whom I refer
to as neorelativists.However radical the neo-Marxistsare in comparison
to the neopositivists, the neorelativistsare conservative.
The debate between Archer and King was precipitatedby King'scrit-
icisms of Archer's recent book, Social Origins of Educational Systems,in a
reviewpublishedin Comparative
Education,of which King is editor.27Briefly,
King views Archer'swork as "somuch quasi-theologyabout 'thinkingand
of structural
theorisingabout educationalsystems,''universalcharacteristics
and
so
forth-all
linked
with
'identification'
of
elaboration,'
repetitious
phenomena, sequences,'causation,''determinants,''laws,''relevantempirical
generalizations, the composition laws, which would then enable one to
compute complex situations,''macro-sociologicallaws,'and the rest of the
long-discredited apparatus of attempting to force educational and other
systems into the typologies beloved of some seminar rooms."28In fact,
Archer's book is an example of orthodox positivism, and it should be
clear from my previousremarksthat King'scharacterizationof the volume
as "so much quasi-theology"is not simply a criticismof the book but of
the orientation that it represents.
SocialOriginsis a workof great subtletyand complexity,and represents
the most ambitiousattempt thus far to achieve the kind of comprehensive
synthesis of propositions about education that positivistscrave. It is about
the mechanismsthroughwhich pressuresfor educationalchange or stability
are transformed into policy. But what is noteworthyhere is that synthesis
is not gained by the use of macro samples of many societies. Instead,
Archeremphasizeshistoricalspecificityand limitsher analysisto educational
policy in only four countries: Denmark, England, France, and Russia.By
examiningthe contextsin whichchangeoccurs,Archerrevealsthe structural
forcesthat encouragethe survivalof distinctivetypes of educationalsystems
26
Robert K. Merton, Social Theoryand Social Structure(New York: Free Press, 1957).
Archer, Social OriginsofEducationalSystems;King's review is in ComparativeEducation 15 (October
1979): 350-52.
28 Edmund King, "Prescription or Partnership in Comparative Studies of Education?" Comparative
Education 16 (June 1980): 185-95, quote on 186.
27
13

EPSTEIN
and the nature of their adaptation to changing environments. In other

words, what Archer does not achieve in terms of representative-sample
reliabilityshe attempts to make up for by being exhaustivein her analysis
of factorsand forceswithinparticularsocieties.Despiteher carefulattention
to contextual specificity, she avoids the kind of extreme historicism to
which Anderson objects. She remains true to the positivist tradition by
observing regularities and drawing overarching generalizations-albeit
extremelycautiously-from data on educationalcentralizationand control,
interest groups, political elites, and economic resources. In a reaction to
her book, Craig comments that "one is tempted to conclude that we now
know everything we could ever want to know about the origins and development of educational systems."29
King's criticismof SocialOriginsprovides insight into the field's third
major theoretical orientation and its attendant ideological impulse. The
neorelativists-proponents of the "problem"approach-and the neoMarxistsmay hold mutuallyincongruousviews,but they sharea skepticism
of positivistthought and methods. King'sview is simply that propositions
generalized cross-nationally are invalid, that all theoretical statements
regarding education must be made entirely within particular contexts,
and that the principal purpose of comparison is not explanation but the
improvementof education, that is, within the context of specificsituations.
However attentiveArcher is to contextual detail, it is not enough to satisfy
King, in view of her tendency to use stereotypessuch as "theimpenetrable
polity" and "thecentralized system" as "constructsinto which real-life
phenomena can be thrust not merely from countryto countryand context
to context but from age to age, and from one stage of development to
quite different circumstances.30 For King, Archer's macrosociological
"message"is no more than a "latterdaysuccessorto theologicalorthodoxy."l1
Archer's reaction to King's criticismis of equal interest not only for
what it shows about her view toward relativismbut what it reflects about
her positivist orientation. In her rejection of the prescriptive value of
comparison she reveals herself to be a more orthodox positivist than
Anderson or Foster, who are concerned with the educational policy implications of development as well as with explanation and generalization.
Archer's remarks are illuminating:
Why then is the comparativemethod found so wantingby King?The answer
lies deep at the heart of the "reformative"purpose of comparativeeducation. It
is because the comparativemethod can never tell us what oughtto be done. To
King the ultimate test of a theoreticalframeworkis quite simply whether it can
John E. Craig, "On the Development of Educational Systems," AmericanJournal of Education
"29
89 (February 1981): 189-211, quote on 201.
30
3'
14
King, p. 187.
Ibid., p. 195.
February1983
EDUCATION
"aid policy development." Hence his blurring of validity with utility parallels the
earlier elision between facts and values and between explanation and prescription .... The instrumental criterion of validity has all the defects... for instrumentalism in general, notably that practical utility need have nothing to do
with verisimilitude, least of all, one would add, in the field of political policy.
Moreover policy formation is quintessentially a political process, in which the
Comparative Educationalist can only be pushed around as a pawn rather than
playing at being King. Any such educationalist would do much better by retreating
to his seminar room and trying to understand this process, with the aid of the
comparative method, than by naivelyjoining one of the "policy-shapingcomparative
'workshops' "... which King says have so "greatly strengthened Comparative
Education since the later 1960s ...."32
The Ideological Bias of Neopositivism
The theoreticalassumptionsof the positivistorientationin comparative

education should by now be clear, as should the objections to positivism
of the neo-Marxists and the neorelativists. The positivists believe that
ordered and repetitive patterns of social processes relating to education
can be abstractedfrom time and spaceby systematically
testingexperientially
derived propositions. And most of the positivists,and here I refer to the
neopositivists, have attempted to apply systematicempirical methods to
observations about the role of education in national development. It is
in this regard that the neo-Marxistsand the neorelativistshave been most
convincing.By showingthat "development"is hardlya universallyaccepted,
value-free objective, they have demonstrated the ideological bias of the
neopositivists.I contend, however,that the neo-Marxistsand neorelativists
are themselves guilty of bias; their assumptions, too, are informed by
ideology.
The Ideological Bias of Neo-Marxism
Marxistsand relativistsdeny the validity of abstractingman's nature

independent of particularsociohistoricalconditions.Marxistsin particular
believe that an individual'scharacteris alwaysdynamic and that human
existence is a process of becoming. For Marx, "rightcan never be higher
than the economic structureof the society and the cultural development
Forhim, ideologyappliesto theoriesthatuniversalize
therebydetermined.""33
historical moments by projecting their characteristicsbeyond historical
time as immutable traits of human nature. Orthodox Marxistsequate
ideology with the writings of intellectuals who, by claiming objective,
universal validity for propositions about social reality,which is to ascribe
permanence and stabilityto social relations,help to preservethe capitalist
32 Margaret Archer, "Sociology and Comparative Education: A Reply to Edmund King," Comparative
Education 16 (June 1980): 179-85, quote on 184.
33 Karl Marx,A Critique of the Gotha Program (New York:InternationalPublishers, 1938), and
ThePovertyof Philosophy
(Moscow:ForeignLanguagesPublishingHouse, n.d.).
15

EPSTEIN
order.34Ideology invariably gives rise to false consciousness, a characteristic
unique to intellectuals and capitalists.
Neo-Marxists, however, and particularly Gramsci, make a distinction
between false consciousness and ideology. For them false consciousnessbeing oblivious to the social relations of production that prevail in societyis not limited to intellectuals and capitalists; the working class in capitalist
societies is also prey to false consciousness. Yet working-class false consciousness is not illusory in the same sense as that of the bourgeoisie; the
delusion of the former is not total because being oppressed means feeling
oppression and being forced to deal with it. False consciousness becomes
the normal way of perceiving and acting within capitalist society, but
tendencies within the basic economic process of capitalist accumulation
"prevent such false consciousness from remaining permanent and secure
among workers. Unlike Marx, the neo-Marxists admit to an ideological
impulse; for them the development of revolutionary class consciousness
is an ideological process of drawing and building on workers' fragmentary
insight. Marxist ideology is thus offered as a counter to burgeois ideology.35
The role of education in neo-Marxism is obviously important. The
school is a two-edged sword; it represents the repressive social conditions
of capitalist society but potentially also the instrument for the dissipation
of false consciousness. Education in capitalist liberal democracies promotes
social class cleavages by transmitting to each successive generation a structured misrepresentation of reality. Rather than seeking "truth," capitalist
schools impose an ideology that dupes the proletariat into contributing
their labor in the production process, benefiting only the ruling class.
They do this by teaching a positivistic world view that emphasizes discovery
through experience and sense impressions. As Freud has shown, however,
sense impressions are deceptive; individuals tend to select particular "facts"
out of an infinite multitude of possibilities and further order and categorize
their observations according to how well they fall into their particular
matrix. We all fall prey to delusions, distortive defense mechanisms, prejudices, group pressures, and mental sets that twist our perceptions of
reality. However, positivists, who rely on sensory experience to obtain
data and whose view of reality is therefore shaped by the fallible senses,
are particularly susceptible to such distortions. Instead of objective knowledge, their reliance on sense perceptions yields a misrepresentation of
reality. Rather than promote the individual as the source of knowledge,
positivist ideology, by viewing knowledge as something to be experienced,
See Koula Mellos, "The Concept of Ideology in Marx," Social Praxis 7 (1980): 5-19.
Antonio Gramsci, Selectionsfrom the Prison Notebooks(London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1971). See
also Georg Lukacs, History and Class Consciousness(Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1972);
J. Femia,
"Hegemony and Consciousness in the Thought of Antonio Gramsci,"Political Studies 23 (1975): 2948; and Ron Eyerman, "False Consciousness and Ideology in Marxist Theory," Acta Sociologica 24
(1981): 43-56.
34
16
February 1983

EDUCATION
transforms the individual into a mere agent in knowledge production.

Education in capitalist society, therefore, may be viewed metaphorically
as a factory,with knowledge as the product emitted by, but existing apart
from and outside the control of, the individual who labors to produce
it.36 World-systemanalysts such as Arnove have extended this critique to
the international arena in an attempt to show that schools contribute to
the emergence and consolidation of a world economic system in the grip
of capitalism.37
Neo-Marxists,while not denying that they, like the neopositivists,have
an ideology, believe that their Marxist ideology is superior. Harris has
gone so far as to propose a test to judge the veracity of the Marxist
perspective of reality against the positivist, liberal democraticview. The
test's sole criterion is the degree to which the ideology serves all social,
economic, and politicalinterestsequally.Not surprisingly,Harrisconcludes
that positivism, in marked contrast to Marxism,fails the test by serving
disproportionatelythe interestsof the bourgeousie. Educationunder capitalism,for example, teachesworking-classchildrento accepttheir ascribed
place in society while legitimating the elevated position of the wealthy.It
does this effectively by emphasizing the self-professedtrappingsof liberal
democracy-the openness of society, universalpoliticalsuffrage, and opportunities for upward social mobility by means of individual effortwhileignoringthe results:relativelylittlerealsocialmobilityand an enduring
inequity in the distribution of wealth and resources. The working-class
child thus learns undeservedly to blame himself for his inferior position,
because he is unable to advance socioeconomicallyamidst a supposed
multitude of opportunities, and the middle- or upper-class child learns
similarly to justify his position vis-a-vis those who are purportedly not
smart or diligent enough to do better. In this way the school teaches a
false consciousness at all social levels, one that plays into the hands of the
rich, even as they too believe the myth of open opportunities.38
Unfortunately, the neo-Marxistsare as given to exaggeratedclaims in
defending their position as are the positivistsin defending theirs.Whereas
the positivists'denial of ideologicalbiasis unsupportable,the neo-Marxists
are on equally unsure grounds in contending the superiority of their
ideology. Consider that for all of their mistrust of empiricism, the neo36 The
neo-Marxist literature relating to education has become extensive in recent years. For a
description of some of its more influential currents, see Vandra Lea Masemann, "Critical Perspectives
on Issues in Comparative Education" (paper presented at the Comparative and International Education
Society meeting, Vancouver, Canada, March 1980); and Pierre Bourdieu and Jean-Claude Passeron,
Reproductionin Education, Societyand Culture (Beverly Hills, Calif.: Sage, 1977).
37 Robert F. Arnove, "Comparative Education and World-System Analysis," ComparativeEducation
Review 24 (February 1980): 48-62; see also Martin Carnoy, Education as Cultural
Imperialism(New
York: McKay, 1974).
38 Kevin Harris, Education and Knowledge: The StructuredMisrepresentation
of Reality (London:
Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1979).
17

EPSTEIN
Marxistsdepend on the validityof certainempiricalclaimsfor the efficacy

of their position. Harris, for example, relies on the findings of Bowles
and Gintis39to show that economic success under capitalismis a function
of the economic system and tends to run in familiesalmost independently
of intelligence (as measured by IQ tests); the rich stay rich and the poor
stay poor regardless of intellectual ability. The Bowles and Gintis data
refute the arguments of geneticists and psychologists,principallyJensen
and Herrnstein,40 that socioeconomic stratificationcan be best explained
by the "fact"that intelligence, "known"to be highly inheritable,is passed
on within economic groups to such an extent that education simplycannot
compensate for genetic differences. Those arguments, Harrisbelieves, by
focusing on the individual rather than on social relations as the source
of economic differences, are rooted in class-serving,self-interest-serving
ideology;their data tend tojustify the perpetuationof class-basedeconomic
inequalities as deriving from real genetic variations in individuals. By
contrast,Bowlesand Gintis'sfindings,in purportedlyshowingthateconomic
inequalityis rooted in this very structureof societyand cannotbe explained
by the intellectual and genetic superiorityof the dominant class, are free
of ideological distortion.
Harris'sposition, however, is dubious at best. Both the Bowles-Gintis
findings and the Jensen-Herrnstein data purportto measurethe influence
of geneticallyinheritableintelligence on economic productivityand status
attainment.The factremains,however,thatthey haveworkedwithdifferent
data sets, which, although susceptible to empirical evaluation, have yet
to be systematicallycompared, and Harris's"test"cannot yield definitive
results given gaps in the current state of knowledge. Bowles and Gintis,
as have many others,4' persuasivelydemonstrate the inadequaciesof the
Jensen-Herrnstein position; but, then again, Bowles and Gintis's data,
purportedlyshowing that schools serve primarilyto develop noncognitive
characteristicsnecessary to the reproduction of the social relations of
production in a capitalist economy, have been found to be largely unsupported by Olneck and Bills.42
Moreover, much of Harris's thesis rests on the supposed failure of
compensatoryeducation programsintroduced in the United Statesin the
39Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis, Schooling in CapitalistAmerica:Educational Reform and the
Contradictionsof EconomicLife (New York: Basic, 1976).
40 Arthur R. Jensen, "How Much Can We Boost IQ and Scholastic Achievement?" Harvard
Educational Review 39 (1969): 1-123; Richard J. Herrnstein, "I.Q." Atlantic Monthly 228 (December
1971): 43-58.
41 See L. J. Kamin, The Science and Politics of I.Q. (New York: Wiley, 1974); N. J. Block and G.
Dworkin, eds., The I.Q. Controversy(New York: Pantheon, 1976); Stephen Jay Gould, "Jensen's Last
Stand," New YorkReview of Books 27 (May 1, 1980): 38-44; and Sandra Scarr, Race, Social Class and
Individual Differencesin I.Q. (Hillsdale, N.J.: Erlbaum, 1981).
42 Michael R. Olneck and David B. Bills, "What Makes Sammy Run? An Empirical Assessment
of the Bowles-Gintis Correspondence Theory," AmericanJournal of Education 89 (November 1980):
27-61.
18
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EDUCATION
1960s to equalize economic opportunities between rich and poor. These

programs, Harris suggests, were mere disguises used to deceive people
into believing the liberal democratic rhetoric about the value of schools
to promote social mobility.Yet recent studies indicate not only that compensatory education programs may have had more of an impact than
early investigations,such as those of Coleman et al. and ofJencks et al.,43
had claimed,44but that school characteristicscan powerfullyaffect student
outcomes and that schools might be able to break the link between class,
race, and academic achievement after all.45For our purposes, the most
importantfindings are by Heyneman and Loxley, who, in an examination
of various influences on academic achievement in Africa, Asia, Latin
America, and the Middle East, show that the power of socioeconomic
status to determine achievement is substantially less in lower-income
countries, and the lower the income of the country the greater is the
power of the school to determine directlystudents'performance.46These
findings challenge the contention of Marxistworld-systemanalysts that
schools, if anything, do even more to perpetuate social class differences
by influencing noncognitive outcomes in the Third World than in technologically advanced countries.47
Ultimately, however, Harris's position fails at the point where neoMarxismis most vulnerable:its view of false consciousnessand the question
of how to deal with it. If the proletariatin capitalistsocietiesis susceptible
to distortions of social reality, and schools serve dominant-classinterests
by perpetuating false consciousness, how can growth in revolutionary
consciousnessbe achieved?Manyneo-Marxists,such as Lukacs,have taken
a Leninist view that the vanguard party rather than the proletariat "is
the historicalembodimentand the activeincarnationof classconsciousness"
and must therefore guide the transition to socialism. By virtue of being
submerged in the travailsof economic necessity, the proletariatis unable
to raise itself as a class to a state of revolutionaryawareness.The party,
on the other hand, by maintaining a creative distance between itself and
43James Coleman, E. Campbell, C. Hobson, et al., Equalityof EducationalOpportunity(Washington,
D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1966); Christopher Jencks, M. Smith, H. Arland, et al.,
Inequality:
A Reassessmentof the Effect of Family and Schooling in America (New York: Basic, 1972).
Irving Lazar and Richard Darlington, Lasting Effectsafter Preschool(ERIC/ECE, 1979).
"44
Diane Ravitch, The RevisionistsRevised: A Critiqueof the Radical Attackon the Schools(New York:
45
Basic, 1978); Wilbur Brookover, Charles Beady, Patricia Flood, et al., SchoolSocial Systemsand Student
Achievement:Schools Can Make a Difference (New York: Praeger, 1979); G. Madaus, T.
Kellaghan, E.
Rakow, and D. King, "The Sensitivity of Measures of School Effectiveness," Harvard Educational
Review 49 (1979): 207-30; and M. Rutter, B. Maughan, P. Mortimore, and J. Ouston, with A. Smith,
Fifteen ThousandHours (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1979).
S. Heyneman and W Loxley, "The Impact of Primary School Quality on Academic Achievement
46
across Twenty-Nine High and Low Income Countries" (paper presented to the American
Sociological
Association Meeting, Toronto, August 1981).
47 Marxist world-system theorists link educational events to the
workings of an international
economic order to explain why the expansion and reform of schooling often help to
perpetuate
19

EPSTEIN
the ideologicallyimprisonedmasses, is capableof constructinga politically

coherent world view from the inchoate sentiments that struggle for
expression within the proletariat. The party actually becomes the "objectification"of the proletariat'sown will, however much the workersare
unableto recognizeit. Fromthis reasoningit is a shortstep to the conclusion
that the very existence of the party is tangible proof of its infallibility.48
Understandably,neo-Marxistssuch as Harris, who focus on the role
of education, tend to avoid discussions of how to achieve revolutionary
consciousnessunder capitalismwhen institutionssuch as the school control
knowledge. They seem to be tacitly sensitive to what Berger calls "epistemologicalarrogance"to describeany processby which some individuals,
by virtue of their putative higher consciousness,help redeem the masses
from capitalistdomination.49Yet neo-Marxistsare unable to reconcile the
condition of domination with a reality that precludes "demystification"
by those who are dominated.50 Without such a reconciliation the neoMarxist position will remain hopelessly impositional;by implication it is
the neo-Marxistswho see themselves as the vanguardto guide the masses
to a new level of consciousness.
There is a final way to test the relative virtue of competing ideologies
using Harris'scriterionof servingall social,economic,and politicalinterests
equally. That is to examine the results not only in capitalistsocieties but
in socialist societies as well, something which Harris neglects to do. In
view of the availableevidence, it would appearthat schools in state socialist
countries have fared no better, and perhaps have done worse, than they
have done in state capitalistcountries in meeting the test. That significant
inequalities exist in state socialist countries has been well documented.
Several studies have shown that informal pay bonuses, special rations,
existing stratification systems. However, recent analyses have seriously questioned the assumptions
and historical reasoning that have given rise to Marxist world-system theory (see, e.g., Chirot [n. 24
above]). Cardoso and Faletto even claim that dependency theory, a Marxist corollary to world-system
theory, is dead (see F. H. Cardoso and E. Faletto, Dependencyand Developmentin LatinAmerica[Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1979]; see also Mary Jean Bowman, review of Martin Carnoy, Education
as Cultural Imperialism,EconomicDevelopmentand Cultural Change 24
[July 1976]: 833-40). Yet not all
world-system analyses are Marxist. In particular, the findings of Meyer, Ramirez, Rubinson, and
Boli-Bennett oppose the Marxist contention that educational expansion has helped to maintain the
existing status hierarchy as well as the functionalist use of modernization to explain educational
growth (John W. Meyer, Francisco O. Ramirez, Richard Rubinson, and John Boli-Bennett, "The
World Educational Revolution, 1950-1970," Sociologyof Education 50 [Fall 1977]: 242-58; see also
John W. Meyer and Michael T. Hannan, eds., National Developmentand the WorldSystem[Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1979]; and Francisco O. Ramirez andJohn Boli-Bennett, "Global Patterns
of Educational Institutionalization," in ComparativeEducation, ed. Philip G. Altbach, Robert F. Arnove,
and Gail P. Kelly [New York: Macmillan, 1982], pp. 15-38).
48 Lukacs, pp. 42 and 327; see also Frank Parkin, Marxism and Class Theory:A
Bourgeois Critique
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1979), pp. 145-55.
L.
Peter
Political
Ethics
and
Social
Berger, Pyramidsof Sacrifice:
49
Change (New York: Basic, 1974),
pp. 19 and 114.
For a discussion of this point, see Erwin H. Epstein, "The Social Control Thesis and Educational
50
Reform in Dependent Nations," Theoryand Society5 (1978): 255-76.
20
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EDUCATION
privilegedaccessto stores selling scarcegoods at lower prices,the provision

of countryhouses, exclusiveaccessto vacationresortsand superiorhospitals
and medical care, and rights to better housing and travel abroad have
created noticeable socioeconomic disparities between the privileged and
the massesin such societies.5Parkinhas observedthat as EasternEuropean
countries have responded to economic inefficienciesby adopting incentive
strategies,they have experienceda clearlydiscerniblepatternof increasing
inequality.Moreover,the record of Communistregimes in protecting the
interests of all groups during the transformationof the rewardstructure
of former capitalisteconomieshas been poor. WhereverCommunistparties
have come to power they have established a unitary political system in
which the former bourgeoisie has been denied rights to oppose social
change, and citizens have been subjectedto gross abuses of constitutional
Schools,of course,have not been exempt fromdisplaysof inequities;
rights.52
investigations have confirmed that children born into the upper socioeconomic strata are more likely than others to attain high levels of education.53Moreover,Jews and certain other minoritiesin the Soviet Union
have been deprived of an equal opportunity for advanced schooling, and
religious instruction has been suppressed.54Until Harris and other neoMarxist scholars can show that their test for the virtue of a theoretical
frameworkis not one-sided, their criticalview of positivismand education
in liberal democracies will appear unreasonable.
We see, in short, that whereas neopositivism seeks to be value free
and objective,neo-Marxismpurportsonly to be objective.55
In other words,
neo-Marxism admits to an absence of detachment in its perspective but
contends that its view of social reality is objective insofar as objectivity
reflects relativetruth. Neorelativism,however-the assumptionsof which
I now examine-purports only to be value free. It professes detachment,
and claims that no particularview of reality is any more or less true than
any other.
51 David Lane, The End of Inequality?Stratificationunder State Socialism(Baltimore: Penguin, 1971);

Mervin Matthews, Class and Societyin Soviet Russia (New York: Walker, 1972); Seymour Martin Lipset
and Richard B. Dobson, "Social Stratification and Sociology in the Soviet Union," Survey, no. 19
(Summer 1973), pp. 114-85; Murray Yanowitch, Social and EconomicInequalityin the Soviet Union:
Six Studies (White Plains, N.Y.: Sharpe, 1977); and Walter D. Connor, Socialism,Politics, and Equality:
Hierarchyand Change in Eastern Europeand the U.S.S.R. (New York: Columbia University Press, 1979).
52 Frank Parkin, Class Inequalityand Political Order (New York: Praeger, 1971).
53Murray Yanowitch and Norton Dodge, "Social Class and Education: Soviet Findings and
Reactions," ComparativeEducation Review 12 (October 1968): 248-67; Richard B. Dobson, "Mobility
and Stratification in the Soviet Union," Annual Review of Sociology3 (1977): 297-329; and Richard
B. Dobson and Michael Swafford, "The Educational Attainment Process in the Soviet Union: A Case
Study," ComparativeEducation Review 24 (June 1980): 252-69.
54Erwin H. Epstein, "Ideological Factors in Soviet Educational Policy toward Jews," Education
and Urban Society 10 (February 1978): 223-54.
55 See Michael Harrington, The Twilight of Capitalism (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1976).
21

EPSTEIN
The Ideological Bias of Neorelativism.
Along with King, Brian Holmes is undoubtedly the best-known neorelativist in comparative education.56Holmes's "problem"approach is
prompted by the rise of relativityin the naturalsciences,which challenges
the concept of absolute measurement and the unconditional validity of
general laws. Holmes contends that social scientists have been slow in
recognizing the cogent meaning of relativityfor socialtheory and research
and for the need of a paradigmatic revolution. Just as relativity gave
reason for questioning the logical validity of the absolutist traditional
concepts of mass, force, and the like in the physical world, so should it
challenge the idea that fundamental eternal laws underlie all behavior
and socialdevelopment,an idea that forms the basisfor most contemporary
social research. Rather than eternal or infalliblelaws, socialtheory should
be informed by a search for contextual generalizationsin which behavior
is seen as governed by specific spatiotemporal,linguistic, and sociopsychological conditions within varying circumstances.Since the pursuit of
absolute laws is fruitless, "pure"research is unwarrantedand represents
a wasteof time and resources.Instead,the socialsciences,and comparative
education in particular,should be responsive to practicalproblems and
the need for application. Piecemeal social engineering oriented to policy
and emphasizing modest objectives within the context of specific initial
conditions and unique national circumstancesshould guide comparative
research. Investigation should begin not with the collection of data but
from a careful identificationand analysisof a discretepracticalproblem.57
Holmes's method represents a refutation of the positivistview that if
all factors giving rise to a particularsocial behavior were known, then a
multivariatestatementwould explainthatbehaviorwhereverand whenever
it occurs. But it is also a repudiation of Marxiandeterminism, the belief
that certaineconomic forces inexorablyshape history.Ratherthan a search
for universal regularities in nature and history, Holmes believes that
comparativesocial research should be guided by a desire to discover the
uniqueness of nations and societies, and he proposes adoption of the
Weberian notion of ideal-typical normative constructs as models with
which to examine particularstructuresand socialrelationships.Such constructs, insofar as they give coherence to the multiplicityof beliefs that
exist in society and provide clues to collective mental states and social
action, are appropriate starting points for investigation. The proposed
- However much
King and Holmes bicker about their mutual epistemological differences, they
both were students of Karl Popper and are very much in the Popperian neorelativist tradition (see
Brian Holmes, Problems in Education: A ComparativeApproach [London: Routledge & Kegan Paul,
1965], p. 53; Edmund J. King, ComparativeStudiesand EducationalDecision [New York: Bobbs-Merrill,
1968], pp. 53-54; Brian Holmes, ComparativeEducation: SomeConsiderationsof Method[London: Allen
& Unwin, 1981], pp. 70-71, and "Models in Comparative Education," Compare11 [1981]: 155-61).
57 Holmes, ComparativeEducation: Some Considerationsof Method.
22
February1983
EDUCATION
use of ideal-typical normative models is not an abrupt departure from

earlier theory in comparative education; analogues may be found in the
ideas of classicalrelativistssuch as MichaelSadler and Vernon Mallinson,
who thought, respectively, that a nation embodied a "living spirit" or a
national character.Ideal-typicalmodels focus more, however, on general
aimsand theoriesregardingman, society,and knowledgethanon intangible,
immanent forces. Holmes contends that aims, theories, and mental states
are relevant constituents of the initial specific conditions associatedwith
the "problem"to which the attention of the researcheris to be directed.
Variousneorelativistshave attemptedto show thateducationalstrategies
lack universal viability. They occasionally follow Piaget in emphasizing
the distinct perspective of each individual organism and its differential
adaptation to the environment. Some have been inspired by ethnomethodological,phenomenological,or symbolicinteractionistmodels, with their
stresson the socialconstructionof realityand the developmentof meaning
through interaction.Clignet,for example,has suggestedthat what happens
in schools is a product of the use that teachers and students make of
distinctiveand conflictingadaptivemechanisms;each individual'sadaptation
varieswith the normativeand sociopsychologicalprofileof each classroom
situation.58Hence no scientificlaw that purports to explain interpersonal
interactions can validly apply to educational practice. Schrag contends
that the contributions of psychology to science and epistemology have
little practical utility in educational reform and policymaking,and that
even our commonsense, pretheoreticalunderstandingof human behavior
is a better guide to practice than psychological theory.59Popper put it
succinctlywhen he said, "Whatwe should do, I suggest, is to give up the
idea of ultimate sources of knowledge, and admit that all knowledge is
human; that it is mixed with our errors, our prejudices,our dreams, our
hopes; that all we can do is to grope for truth even though it be beyond
our reach. We may admit that our groping is often inspired, but we must
be on our guard againstthe belief, howeverdeeply felt, that our inspiration
carries any authority."60
Of the three main currents in comparative education, neorelativism
seems on the surface to be the least given to ideology. It contends, after
all, that all sources of knowledge-whether embodied in Marxistdeterminism or in the palpable regularitiessought by positivists-are without
authority. Yet both Marxistsand positivistswould be correct in arguing
58 Remi Clignet, "The Double Natural History of Educational Interactions: Implications for
Educational Reforms," ComparativeEducation Review 25 (October 1981): 330-52; see also M. Mulkay,
Science and the Sociologyof Knowledge (London: Allen & Unwin, 1979).
59 Francis Schrag, "Knowing and Doing," AmericanJournal of Education 89 (May 1981): 253-82;
see also D. C. Phillips, "Toward an Evaluation of the Experiment in Educational Contexts," Educational
Researcher 10 (June/July 1981): 13-20.
Karl Popper, Conjecturesand Refutations (New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1968), pp. 29-30.
60
23

EPSTEIN
that however much relativism may appear to be unbiased and free of

partisan values, its effects are assuredly ideological. This is most apparent
from a Marxist viewpoint, since any position that professes that no position
has moral authority will tend to leave unchallenged the dominant ideology,
which often, of course, happens to be capitalism.
More problematic but perhaps more cogent, however, is the positivist
critique, consisting of two components. The first applies to the relativists'
method of imaginative sympathy, that is, the method of understanding
behavior by identifying with others' motives and points of view. Here
there is a fallacy in that an understanding of behavior gained through
the use of such a method can never be used to explain that behavior;
identification with others' motives and views does not constitute valid
evidence of an explanation, since it cannot be corroborated. For one thing,
when we think we have identified ourselves with others, we may only
have imposed our own feelings on them, however much we may think
we grasp the relevant psychosocial contextual circumstances. For another
thing, even if we somehow succeeded in projecting ourselves into the
minds of others, to see things exactly as they do is to share their selfdeceptions. As Frankel put it, "if we really believed that we can only prove
the truth of a theory about human behavior by taking the attitude of the
human beings we are talking about, we would ask paranoids to verify our
theories about paranoia."61
The second component of the positivist critique focuses on the existence
of certain permanent demands of human nature and certain unchanging
necessities in human society that govern the effects that an idea has in
history. There seems to be an intangible, universal need to believe that
what one does is part of an eternal design, that one's accomplishments
and hopes are not all bound to be swallowed up by time.62 Human needs
and demands give rise to fundamentally similar responses. We see, therefore,
that classes of nations display common syndromes of historical, cultural,
and social characteristics that cannot be explained by unique psychosocial
contexts or by shared ideal-typical normative patterns. Modern nationstates manifest considerable institutional commonalities; they have legislatures, public administrative systems, armies, and interest groups.
Structurally similar institutional arrangements suggest that certain functional
linkages commonly exist, linkages that cannot properly be tested if each
society is examined as a unique entity. The kind of ideographic research
advanced by the neorelativists may be of value in producing insights about
the nature of education under given circumstances and can inform policy,
but it can hardly be effective in systematically disentangling the relevant
61
62
24
Charles Frankel, The Casefor Modern Man (Boston: Beacon, 1956), p. 130.
See Jacques Maritain, Scholasticismand Politics, trans. M. J. Adler (London: Bles, 1940).
February1983

EDUCATION
factors associated with education in a specified cultural situation from the

irrelevant factors.
The most disturbing aspect of relativism, however, is that it too is not
free of ideology. To suggest that every human event must be judged from
the unique perspective of the participants is ultimately not an unbiased
ideal. Consider Frankel's cogent analysis:
In the end, indeed, there is an embracing paradox about the idea that all
ideas about human affairs are true only from the point of view of a particular
culture or social class. This statement is itself an idea about human affairs. If,
like all other such ideas, it is a doctrine which is true for some people but false
for others, there is no reason why people who hold a different point of view
should pay any attention to it. If, on the other hand, it is not limited in its validity,
then it is an exception to the very generalization it utters. It is one example of
an idea whose truth transcends the historical circumstances in which it is uttered.
And if there is one such idea, it seems arbitrary to suggest that there can be no
others.63
If, indeed, the concept of relativity is not limited in its validity, and
its truth transcends the historical circumstances in which it is uttered,
then it seems logical that certain individuals -those trained to evaluate
events in terms of their unique psychosocial circumstances, namely, the
relativists -must be the ones called upon to expose systematically the
partiality of all ideas. Such a formulation is Platonic in its implications;
it invites the establishment of an oligarchy of intellectuals to be the guardians
if not of "truth" then of the norms of correct procedure.64
Conclusion
Now that I have gored everybody's ox, where do I go from here? One
thing I shall not do is to suggest the absolute superiority or inferiority of
one or another of the three major currents in comparative education, for
that would be contrary to my purpose. What I have attempted to do in
the main is to show how inextricably ideological each current is, and I
wish to argue for a fundamental change in the way we conceptualize the
development of our field.
The conventional view of our field's development was established most
firmly by Noah and Eckstein, who identify five evolutionary stages: (1)
traveler's tales, (2) educational borrowing, (3) international educational
cooperation, (4) identification of the forces and factors shaping national
educational systems, and (5) social science explanation. Although Noah
and Eckstein admit that these stages are far from being discrete in time,
63
Frankel,pp. 135-36.
"6This is essentially what Mannheim proposed (see Karl Mannheim, Ideologyand Utopia [New
York:Harcourt,Brace, 1951]).
25

EPSTEIN
their model is clearly evolutionary and as such is unsupportable and

misleading. By virtue of their use of the word "period" to describe stages,
their frequent allusion to historical circumstances associated with particular
methods, and their emphasis on purposeful development, it is clear that
they see each stage as a distinct occurrence in a larger evolutionary progression toward gaining clarity in understanding school-society relationships.
Consider first their purpose: to reveal "the gradual, unsteady emergence
of an empirically based, social scientific approach in comparative education,
the history of which begins with simple narrative sometimes naive, but
often astute, and ends, for the present with the application of the sophisticated methods now being employed in the social sciences." And,
second, consider their claim that their evolutionary model, "loose though
it is, provides a convenient, unforced framework within which to review
the development of the field."65I contend, however, that evolutionary
development may be ascribed to discrete epistemological currents, but
not to comparative education overall, and that the evolutionary model is
hardly an unforced framework within which to view the field's development.
The evolutionary model is inadequate because it violates three principles
of theory construction: internal consistency, mutual exclusivity, and inclusiveness.66 Let us consider first the related principles of internal consistency and mutual exclusivity.
A given theoretical model rests on the stability of its categories, which,
in the case of Noah and Eckstein's model, are stages of development. For
a category to be stable it must contain properties that in their internal
consistency are reasonably distinguishable from properties of other categories. In Noah and Eckstein's evolutionary model, the properties of
any given developmental stage, except for time itself, are virtually indistinguishable from any other. For instance, Noah and Eckstein characterize
the early nineteenth-century writings of Marc-Antoine Jullien as "the
prime example" of work done during the stage of educational borrowing.
Yet their description of Jullien's contribution makes it clear that he had
65
Noah and Eckstein (n. 1 above), p. 4.

66These principles correspond roughly to particular criteria for assessing theories in the philosophyof-science literature. Internal consistency and mutual exclusivity are analogues of logical consistency,
and inclusiveness is similar to the scope of a theory (see Philipp G. Frank, The Validationof
Scientific
Theories[Boston: Beacon, 1956], pp. 3-36; and Jack Gibbs, SociologicalTheoryConstruction[Hinsdale,
Ill.: Dryden, 1972], pp. 58-70). For an explanation of how the criterion of logical
consistency can
apply to dealing a "death blow" to a theory, see James D. Carney and Richard K. Scheer, Fundamentals
of Logic (New York: Macmillan, 1964), pp. 367-68. A variety of disciplines have violated the principle
of inclusiveness. The early years of American sociology, for example, were marked by narrow
ideological
boundaries that restricted reasonable considerations of Marxian thought (see Duskey Lee Smith,
and
the
Rise
of
in
The Sociologyof Sociology,ed. Larry Reynolds
"Sociology
Corporate Capitalism,"
and Janice Reynolds [New York: McKay, 1970], pp. 68-81; Herman Schwendinger
andJulia Schwendinger, The Sociologistsof the Chair [New York: Basic, 1974]; and PatrickJ. Gurney, "Historical Origins
of Ideological Denial: The Case of Marx in American Sociology," American Sociologist 16
[August
1981]: 196-201).
26
February 1983

EDUCATION
little in common with the most prominent of his contemporaries. Indeed,

Jullien was interested in observing regularities in educational practice
through the collection of cross-national data, an activity that identifies
him far more accurately as a positivist than as an educational borrower.
It is interesting that Noah and Eckstein display their ideological bias as
positivists by describing Jullien's work not as the precursor of a particular
stream, that of positivism, within comparative education, but as the beginning of modern comparative education as a field overall, which it is
not. By contrast, they describe the "borrowing" of Jullien's fellow countryman and contemporary, Victor Cousin, in less favorable terms as oriented
to the strength of French culture and "the indestructible unity of our
national character," thus revealing Cousin's decidedly relativistic tendencies.67 To place two individuals like Jullien and Cousin, who were so
mutually opposed epistemologically and ideologically, in the same category,
as do Noah and Eckstein, violates the principle of internal consistency
and stretches the imagination beyond reason. Noah and Eckstein then
proceed to describe Michael Sadler's work at the turn of the twentieth
century as bridging the stage of data collecting "of an encyclopedic and
somewhat indiscriminate order" with the forces and factors period.68 In
reality, Sadler's preoccupation with education as "an expression of national
life and character," despite his rather advanced scientific methods for the
period, reveals his affinity to Cousin rather than to Jullien, and to relativists
both before and after his time. By ignoring Sadler's negligible influence
on nonrelativists and glorifying his contributions to the field overall, Noah
and Eckstein and other comparative educationists persistently violate the
principle of mutual exclusivity. Kazamias and Massialas,in a fit of hyperbole,
go so far as to argue that "Sadlerianprinciples have become the cornerstones
of the theoretical orientation of twentieth century comparative education."69
Finally, Noah and Eckstein's violation of the principle of inclusiveness is
displayed by their framework's complete neglect of Marxism. Nowhere
do they have room in their analysis for Marxism or the radical critique
in comparative education as part of any stage in the field's development.
Another test for judging the adequacy of a framework to grasp a
field's development lies in its ability to discern the field's cumulative life.
As I have shown, the evolutionary model fails in the last analysis because
it attempts to view the major currents in comparative education within
the same universe of discourse, when in fact these orientations proceed
from incompatible philosophical theories of truth and irreconcilable ideologies that keep each of them in a closed niche. Yet, however much we
67
Noah and Eckstein (n. 1 above), pp. 14-33.
Ibid., pp. 40-57 and 65.

"68
69
Andreas M. Kazamias and Byron G. Massialas, Traditionand Changein Education:A

Comparative
Study (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1965), p. 3.
27

EPSTEIN
might lament the self-righteous superiority that each of these currents

proclaims against the others, and what this may imply in regard to achieving
unity for our field, each of them displays a strong cumulative life of its
own and a proven ability to attract disciples who keep the faith. The field
as a whole cannot claim to be as successful. The fact that exponents of
each current are reluctant to accept the methods and findings of the
others signifies that knowledge accumulation is not so much within the
generalized field as it is partitioned selectively according to ideological
affinity. Neo-Marxists have very little to say to neopositivists and neorelativists, and the latter have very little to say to the former and to each
other. That the field is able to survive at all is due more to the pragmatic
expediency of association-a group marriage of convenience, if you willwhen numbers are small and resources to support meetings and journals
are scant, and to a common interest in comparison, however variously
defined, than to common epistemological assumptions and a shared universe
of discourse about education.
Comparative education has not evolved as a unitary field but as a loose
unity of separate though thriving currents. It is strange that despite the
adherence of scholars to one or another of these incompatible currents,
very few analysts have discerned their ideological incongruities. A notable
exception is Paulston, who advances a paradigmatic model of the field's
development. Unfortunately, although Paulston satisfies the principles of
internal consistency and mutual exclusivity, and therefore posits a framework that is a considerable improvement over the evolutionary model,
he violates the principle of inclusiveness by completely ignoring the relativist
tradition. More important, although he pays lip service to the role of
ideology in paradigm construction, Paulston vitiates its meaning by calling
for a common framework that would specify "testable generalizations
about necessary and sufficient conditions for large-scale structural and
normative change efforts," and that would be "locked into neither functionalist nor conflict theory but [would draw] selectively and critically on
each orientation."70 Regrettably, ideologies are less amenable to such accommodating impulses than Paulston would have us believe.
The danger that ideology poses to our field is not 'so much in terms
of its simple existence as it is in terms of our tendency to avoid its recognition.
If, indeed, ideology is an inescapable part of whatever epistemology we
subscribe to, we can learn to live with it only by admitting to its existence
in our own scholarship. This act of admission and the application of our
energies to dealing with ideology in our own work would serve two vital
purposes: (1) it would make us more self-conscious about the bias and
Paulston (n. 4 above), p. 395. Paulston's framework includes the equilibrium paradigm, which
70
shares assumptions in common with neopositivism, and the conflict paradigm, whose most prominent
analogue is neo-Marxism:
28
February1983
EDUCATION
values that infuse our own methods, and thereby contribute to a more
informed scholarship; and (2) it would make us less self-righteous about
the scholarship of others with different epistemologies, and thereby help
to avoid internecine quarrels that could tear apart our field. Because
comparison involves interaction among cultures and polities and their
varying sensibilities, and education concentrates on the most impressionable
segment of society, the nature of comparative education is particularly
delicate and vulnerable to devastating cleavages. It is not enough to be
able to rely on the commonalities of nonacademic activities-the preparation
of meetings, the printing of journals, the publication of newsletters, the
establishment of communication networks, etc.-to help us overcome our
philosophical differences and keep our field alive. We must also work
conscientiously to understand those differences and to respect, however
critical we may be of them, the fundamental assumptions and beliefs of
others. Until the day we discover a one best method of scholarship, this
is the most we can hope to do. On this note I am reminded of the words
of George Orwell, who wrote, "I know it is the fashion to say that most
of recorded history is lies anyway. I am willing to believe that history is
for the most part inaccurate and biased, but what is peculiar to our own
age is the abandonment of the idea that history can be truthfully written.""
What Orwell said of history may yet apply to comparative education. If
we are to avoid that danger we must do better in the future than we have
done in the past. I trust that with sensitivity toward others' presuppositions,
a forbearance of dissensus, and a healthy recognition of ideology that
informs our own thought, we shall do better. However much we may
disagree over methods and however contervailing are our epistemological
assumptions, we must guard against the exercise of our respective beliefs
in such a way as to narrow the scope of inquiry for others. Our vigilance
will reap ample rewards in the new paths to be paved and in the maturity
that is sure to follow from mutual understanding.
George Orwell, Such, Such WeretheJoys (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1953), p. 141.
"71
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Presidential Address

Currents Left and Right:

The thought that scholarship may not be wholly invulnerable to ideology

It has become conventional in our field to view the development of

This content downloaded from 121.052.159.181 on October 05, 2016 05:02:15 AM

the title of whose influential book, Towarda Scienceof Comparative

This content downloaded from 121.052.159.181 on October 05, 2016 05:02:15 AM

This exchange focused on educational policy for developing countries.

on the disabilities of functionalism is familiar to most of us, the critique

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educational structures are elaborate and tortured excursions into a reality

Anderson claims that the purpose of comparative education is "to deal

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7 (1961): 24-43, quote on 29.

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studies, which measure theoretical variables in large, worldwide samples

This content downloaded from 121.052.159.181 on October 05, 2016 05:02:15 AM

suggesting the importance of refining units of analysis to advance the

This content downloaded from 121.052.159.181 on October 05, 2016 05:02:15 AM

was translatedinto policy by the MarshallPlan and Point FourLegislation.

This content downloaded from 121.052.159.181 on October 05, 2016 05:02:15 AM

applies. Typical behavior is normative behavior. To make known what

icisms of Archer's recent book, Social Origins of Educational Systems,in a

This content downloaded from 121.052.159.181 on October 05, 2016 05:02:15 AM

and the nature of their adaptation to changing environments. In other

The Ideological Bias of Neopositivism

The theoreticalassumptionsof the positivistorientationin comparative

Marxistsand relativistsdeny the validity of abstractingman's nature

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This content downloaded from 121.052.159.181 on October 05, 2016 05:02:15 AM

transforms the individual into a mere agent in knowledge production.

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Marxistsdepend on the validityof certainempiricalclaimsfor the efficacy

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1960s to equalize economic opportunities between rich and poor. These

Comparative Education Review

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the ideologicallyimprisonedmasses, is capableof constructinga politically

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privilegedaccessto stores selling scarcegoods at lower prices,the provision

51 David Lane, The End of Inequality?Stratificationunder State Socialism(Baltimore: Penguin, 1971);

Comparative Education Review

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The Ideological Bias of Neorelativism.

use of ideal-typical normative models is not an abrupt departure from

Comparative Education Review

This content downloaded from 121.052.159.181 on October 05, 2016 05:02:15 AM

that however much relativism may appear to be unbiased and free of

This content downloaded from 121.052.159.181 on October 05, 2016 05:02:15 AM

factors associated with education in a specified cultural situation from the

This content downloaded from 121.052.159.181 on October 05, 2016 05:02:15 AM

their model is clearly evolutionary and as such is unsupportable and

Noah and Eckstein (n. 1 above), p. 4.

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little in common with the most prominent of his contemporaries. Indeed,

Noah and Eckstein (n. 1 above), pp. 14-33.

Ibid., pp. 40-57 and 65.

Andreas M. Kazamias and Byron G. Massialas, Traditionand Changein Education:A

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might lament the self-righteous superiority that each of these currents

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